A Celtic Psaltery

This is a poetry book. Celtic Psaltery because it mainly consists of close and free translations from Irish, Scotch Gaelic, and Welsh Poetry of a religious or serious character. The first half of the book is concerned with Irish poems. The first group of these starts with the dawning of Christianity out of Pagan darkness, and the spiritualising of the Early Irish by the wisdom to be found in the conversations between King Cormac MacArt the Irish ancestor of our Royal Family and his son and successor. King Carbery. Here also will be found those pregnant ninth-century utterances known as the Irish Triads. Next follow poems attributed or relating to some of the Irish saints Patrick, Columba, Brigit, Moling; Lays of Monk and Hermit, Religious Invocations, Reflections and Charms and Lamentations for the Dead, including a remarkable early Irish poem entitled The Mothers Lament at the Slaughter of the Innocents and a powerful peasant poem, The Keening of Mary. The Irish section is ended by a set of songs suggested by Irish folktunes. Of the early Irish Religious Poetry here translated it may be observed that the originals are not only remarkable for fine metrical form but for their cheerful spirituality, their open-air freshness and their occasional touches of kindly himiour. Irish religious poetry, it has been well said, ranges from single quatrains to lengthy compositions dealing with a Uthe varied aspects of religious Ufe. Many of them give us a fascinating insight into the peculiar character of the early Irish Church, which differed in so many ways from the Christian world.